Anthropology for Beginners

SEPTEMBER 27, 2021

Application of Archaeology Archaeology is the study of human past through material remains. archaeologists study past humans and societies primarily through their material remains – the buildings, tools, and other artifacts that constitute what is known as the material culture left over from former societies.

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Teaching Anthropology

JUNE 12, 2023

London Anthropology day, 30 th June 2023, British Museum Are you fascinated by different cultures? Curious about human evolution? Discover what anthropology is all about by popping along to the British Musuem for London Anthropology Day. Or looking for a broad and exciting degree?

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Anthropology.net

MARCH 25, 2025

The results challenge long-held assumptions about how early humans controlled tool shape and suggest that the differences in Levallois core designs may be more influenced by cultural traditions than previously thought​ Why Levallois Technology Matters Levallois technology represents a milestone in human cognitive and technological evolution.

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Teaching Anthropology

SEPTEMBER 8, 2023

Anna Apostolidou PhD, Assistant Professor of Social Anthropology, Ionian University Given the history of our discipline, it seems rather peculiar that anthropologists are not more “naturally inclined” to employ multimodality in their research and teaching.

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Sapiens

JANUARY 13, 2025

Special Rapporteur on Climate Change and Human Rights, met with stakeholders in the Philippines to report on the status of the country regarding environmental and human rights protection. Read the introduction to the collection here. In November 2023 , Ian Fry , the first U.N.

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Anthropology.net

NOVEMBER 13, 2024

These findings offer new insights into the evolutionary pathways of dexterity and cultural development that began long before the genus Homo emerged. sediba hand displayed more human-like traits compared to the mosaic of apelike and humanlike features found in the hands of A. sediba had hand muscles more similar to humans than to apes.

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Anthropology.net

MARCH 1, 2025

The implications of these findings stretch beyond linguistics, touching on anthropology, cognitive science, and the ways we think about early childhood development. This suggests that early language acquisition is not just about linguistic input—it is deeply tied to the cultural and social fabric of a child’s upbringing.

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Anthropology.net

JANUARY 18, 2025

In the 8th century CE, the Avars—an enigmatic group with roots in the East Asian steppes—settled in Central Europe, weaving a tapestry of cultural cohesion amid genetic diversity. Their findings reveal an intriguing story of cultural integration despite distinct genetic divides.

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Anthropology.net

MAY 15, 2025

Domestication as a Turning Point in Human Evolution The domestication of plants and animals is often framed as a cornerstone of civilization. Spengler III A growing number of archaeologists and evolutionary biologists now argue that domestication wasn’t simply something humans did to other species. DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2413207122

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Anthropology.net

DECEMBER 3, 2024

This suggests that children may have recognized and elaborated upon the figurative potential of their own creations, blending play and representation in a uniquely human way. Children, Metaphorical Thinking, and Upper Paleolithic Visual Cultures Author : Nowell, A. Journal : Evolutionary Human Sciences , 2020. DOI : 10.1017/ehs.2020.37

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Teaching Anthropology

DECEMBER 16, 2023

In preparation for a class based my 2022 article in Teaching Anthropology, Toward a Pedagogy for Consumer Anthropology: Method, Theory, Marketing , I provided ChatGPT with the following prompt: Use the research findings below to create 12 marketing ideas for Duncan Hines cake mix.

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Anthropology News

MARCH 27, 2025

Cultural artifacts, traditions, and knowledge do not simply move; they shift, adapt, and sometimes disappear in the process. When MySpace lost 50 million songs during a server migration , it wasnt just a glitchit was a reshaping of independent music history, determined by infrastructure choices rather than cultural value.

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Anthropology.net

FEBRUARY 18, 2025

A Discovery in the Desert The story of human migration is often told in sweeping arcs—great waves of Homo sapiens leaving Africa, moving into Eurasia, and eventually populating the entire planet. Credit: Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences (2025). Credit: Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences (2025).

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Sapiens

OCTOBER 31, 2024

My point is to communicate that there are many languages and, therefore, an incredible diversity of ways humans think, reason, and feel. This leads to negative outcomes for communities, including the loss of unique cultural knowledge. But pinpointing a more precise number opens the door to all sorts of problems. WHY COUNT LANGUAGES?

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Anthropology.net

MARCH 31, 2025

The shift from a hunter-gatherer existence to an agrarian lifestyle stands as one of the most profound transformations in human history. However, recent research challenges this narrative, emphasizing the pivotal role of human interactions and demographic dynamics in this monumental change.​ Szécsényi-Nagy, A.,

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Anthropology for Beginners

SEPTEMBER 26, 2023

Cultural Relativism Cultural Relativism expresses the idea that the beliefs and practices of others are best understood in the light of the particular cultures in which they are found. Most societies are not relativist: they view their own ways as good, other people's as bad, inferior, or immoral a form of ETHNOCENTRISM.

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Anthropology for Beginners

NOVEMBER 28, 2021

It is also known as physical anthropology, which originally referred to the study of human biology within the framework of evolution and with an emphasis on the interaction between biology and culture. Thousands of specimens of human ancestors (mostly fragmentary) are now kept in research collections.

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Teaching Anthropology

MAY 8, 2023

Marilou Polymeropoulou, University of Oxford, School of Anthropology and Museum Ethnography Active learning is a well-established pedagogical strategy in secondary and tertiary education where independent learning and critical thinking are nurtured. Three challenges in teaching anthropology. Teaching Anthropology 1 (2), pp.

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Anthropology.net

APRIL 14, 2025

” That insight—often stated in anthropological circles—is easy to romanticize but hard to quantify. “We wanted to ask not just whether Inuit languages have many words for snow,” said the team, “but whether the same patterns hold across dozens of cultures and environmental niches.”

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Anthropology News

SEPTEMBER 20, 2024

Intersectional Anthropology. I’ll start with a confession: I am not a cultural anthropologist. Here, I share about my class, “Intersectional Anthropology,” and reflect on some of the ways it has played into my career, while also acknowledging my privileges as a person who holds a Ph.D.

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Anthropology.net

DECEMBER 19, 2024

For decades, archaeologists have described the architectural evolution of early human settlements as a transition from circular to rectangular structures—a shift thought to reflect deeper societal changes. These sites span from the Natufian culture (15,000 years ago) to the early Neolithic period (8,500 years ago).

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Teaching Anthropology

FEBRUARY 1, 2023

To his point, I find the current slew of handwashing videos on YouTube and other sites to be excellent resources for anthropology class projects, and utilize several in an activity that nurtures introductory students’ skills in critical thinking and observation. Human hygiene is taken as an example. It is not one size fits all’.

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Anthropology.net

APRIL 2, 2025

During the African Humid Period (14,500–5,000 years ago), this region supported thriving human populations. Their findings, recently published in Nature , challenge existing models of early human migration and isolation in North Africa. View of the Takarkori rock shelter in Southern Libya. ©

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Anthropology.net

APRIL 30, 2025

A new study in Scientific Reports 1 argues that their grammar preserves a faint but measurable imprint of the first humans to populate the continent. Naranjo have identified a gradient in grammatical complexity across the Western Hemisphere that aligns with the likely direction of prehistoric human expansion. link] Reich, D.

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Anthropology.net

MAY 1, 2025

The Bone Archive of Human History If genes are blueprints, skulls are blueprints weathered by time. The results hint at a Europe in flux: a continent repeatedly reshaped not just by migration but by the slow churn of diet, disease, and cultural transformation. BC, without cultural affiliation, Věstonice cluster).

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Anthropology.net

MAY 1, 2025

These stories speak of migration, of belonging, of origins tied to Chaco Canyon, one of the great ceremonial and cultural centers of the ancient Puebloan world. People cast shadows on the ancient Anasazi ruins of Chaco Culture National Historical Park in New Mexico on Nov. The interpretation was shaped by cultural context.

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Anthropology for Beginners

NOVEMBER 10, 2022

iv] Anthropological attention to Peasant study: Although Robert Redfield’s fieldwork in Mexico as early as 1926 is considered to be the first attempt to see peasant as an analytical category, the study of peasant or the use of the term peasant is quite old.

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Anthropology.net

FEBRUARY 18, 2025

A Genetic Mystery Unraveled For years, scientists have tried to piece together the evolutionary puzzle of human language. What genetic shifts allowed humans to develop the intricate vocal control necessary for language? Research suggests that mutations in the human NOVA1 gene may have played a role in the development of language.

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Sapiens

APRIL 22, 2025

A Multinational, Multiethnic Alternative in Chile’s Migrant Settlements 221 Politicians, 23 Journalists, and Six Human Rights Activists Detained Since the Presidential Elections SAPIENS: A Podcast for Everything Human is produced by Written In Air. Is One Third of Venezuelas Population About to Flee?

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Anthropology News

AUGUST 18, 2024

Anthropology has long been celebrated as a discipline that offers profound insights into human cultures, societies, and behaviors. Its holistic approach and emphasis on reflexivity have contributed significantly to our understanding of the human experience.

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Anthropology News

JUNE 27, 2024

AI is shaping our everyday lives, but as anthropology teaching faculty, most of our recent AI-related conversations have had a singular focus: how to deal with generative AI tools like ChatGPT in the classroom. Below, we present case studies from three anthropology courses using three different sets of AI tools.

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Anthropology for Beginners

DECEMBER 9, 2021

Cultural Dimensions of health Contents style='mso-element:field-begin'> TOC o "1-3" h z u Cultural Dimensions of health. Cultural Dimensions of health Contents style='mso-element:field-begin'> TOC o "1-3" h z u Cultural Dimensions of health. A specialised branch of anthropology, i.e,

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Anthropology News

SEPTEMBER 3, 2024

The courses covered many domains—design, medicine, the environment—but most featured an anthropological flair, and most of the organizers had an anthropology background. I titled my course—one of the four core courses—“Tears of the Earth: An Anthropological Thinking Experiment.”

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Sapiens

MAY 13, 2025

In this episode, anthropologist Justin Lee Haruyama takes us to Zambia, where Chinese investment is bringing two cultures together in the country’s mines. His writing has appeared in The Chicago Tribune , The South China Morning Post , Anthropology News , Somatosphere , Cultural Anthropology , and elsewhere.

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Sapiens

FEBRUARY 13, 2024

In featuring three SAPIENS poems, students in a digital anthropology seminar infused video reels for Instagram with vivid history and powerful emotions. ✽ For a digital anthropology seminar at the University of Denver, I asked my students: “Why do the pressures of our lived realities demand a response through poetry?”

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Anthropology for Beginners

NOVEMBER 13, 2022

DECENTRALISATION and ANTHROPOLOGY Decentralisation is the process of dispersing decision-making governance closer to the people and/or citizen. Law, science and technological advancements lead to highly decentralized human endeavours. This is the largest experiment in decentralisation of governance in the history of humanity.

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Anthropology.net

SEPTEMBER 20, 2024

A groundbreaking study 1 of ancient human DNA from the Oakhurst rock shelter in South Africa is shedding new light on population history in one of the world’s earliest regions of modern human activity. It contained more than 40 human graves and preserved layers of human artifacts, such as stone tools, going back 12,000 years.”

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